Recipes and menus for the world's holidays, including Christmas, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Rosh Hoshannah, Valentine's Day and many others,

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After a long sabbatical, I plan to post new snippets with some holiday recipes from around the world. May your upcoming holiday preparations be interesting and fun. Stay happy and healthy until I write again.

In this salad I use the original beets as it lends a festive air to this Mexican style salad. If you want to use this for a dessert instead, leave the beets out. Fresh beets are best, but for ease of preparation canned beets may be used if thoroughly drained. Fresh fruit is preferred. Sugar is the only sweet added or it may also be served with a thinned mayonnaise. I like the following combination, but you can substitute a fruit ingredient for some other that you prefer.

As promised, here is Aunt Julie Martins’ turkey stuffing recipe that was handed down for generations. It is a very simple stuffing and one that does not present too much of a challenge for the everyday cook. You can vary some of the add-in ingredients to suit your taste and mix them up for different flavor combinations.

Put washed, dried and dressed turkey on rack in roasting pan. To prepare stuffing, tear bread into bite size, irregular shaped pieces and place in a stock pot, very large metal bowl or another roasting pan. Add the large finely chopped onion. Season stuffing with sage, rosemary, parsley, thyme, salt and pepper. Add salt and pepper and mix together well. Put in your choice of cranberries, raisins or dried apricot. Add chopped nuts. To this add just enough butter or margarine to moisten. Add a small amount of broth to this to moisten it just slightly more. Remember that the liquid from the turkey will permeate the dressing, giving it more volume. Stuff turkey with dressing. If you have extra mixture, stuff neck cavity by loosening skin to form a pocket.
Cook as directed in previous post for Real Roast Turkey. After cooling turkey, remove stuffing immediately. Do not store finished turkey with stuffing inside. The internal temperature of stuffing should read 165 degrees on a meat thermometer.

I hope you enjoy this turkey stuffing. We’ve been making it this way in my family for over 100 years. It’s very simple and straightforward. This is very good to use in turkey sandwiches after the holiday is over.

Remembrance Day falls this year in Canada on November 11th. Some provinces and territories celebrate it, also, on November 12th. My Dad hails from Newfoundland, and at times he made what he called scrappy pie to celebrate it. It is on Remembrance Day there that Canadians remember all of the fallen soldiers from past wars.

My great-uncle Charles was killed in Belgium in the first World War and is buried where he was killed defending his fallen comrades. His name is called out and his memory is saluted by a contingent of military members at Parliament every year on this day. For this I simply give you my father’s Americanized version of Scrappy Pie (or Newfoundland Seafood Pie):

Sift flour into a large bowl. Using a pastry blender or fork, mix this with the mashed potato until thoroughly blended. Blend in the butter, then draw into a dough, adding a bit of water until dough sticks together. Wrap dough in pastic and chill in the refrigerator for 1/2 hour.

Prepare filling by cutting fish into chucks and putting them into a 10 inch pie pan or baking dish. Mix in the seafood, onions, peas, parsley and zest. Blend the cornstarch with a bit of milk in a bowl. Heat the remaining milk almost to boiling and stir it into the cornstarch mixture. Return mixture to pan and stir until the mixture thickens. Add seasoning and pour over fish filling. Cool for 20 minutes. Bring oven to 400F (200C).

Roll out the dough between sheets of wax paper to overlap to of pie plate. Remove the top of the waxed paper and use the bottom sheet to help position dough on top of seafood mixture.

Press dough around edges of pan and clean up the edges. Slash center of pie with small knife to vent steam. Brush the crust with milk and sprinkle liberally with plain breadcrumbs.

Put pie on a baking sheet Bake for 10 minutes – then drop temperature to 350F (180C). Bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.

My father cooked this for us when we were very young and it’s the closest I can come to the original recipe. I sought out Scrappy Pie recipes everywhere to no avail, so if someone could forward me more from the great nation of Canada, I would greatly appreciate it.

May you stay safe and sound on Remembrance Day. And to my remaining Newfoundland cousins, may the sea treat you right and the cod keep running.

In the United States, Veterans Day falls on November 11th this year. I am offering this little essay for your enjoyment. It was written by me when I was just a girl of twelve years old in response to a national contest sponsered by the Lodge of Elks in my hometown. I won the contest in the girls’ division and was very proud to have attended a ceremony where the essay was read by a group of veterans. The premise of the contest was to write a piece about ‘Old Glory‘ and how it related to veterans who fought in our many conflicts. I don’t know how appropriate it is to reprint here, but the sentiment then was heartfelt, and it remains that way to me today.

WHAT OLD GLORY MEANS TO ME

To me Old Glory means just what its famous name says, a flaming glory. It symbolizes the honor, pride, trust and independence of the United State of America. Old Glory is not just a flag. It’s more than that. It’s more than a piece of red, white and blue cloth made up of stars and stripes. Maybe it’s a beginning of a deserved liberty and feedom, and a country where the freedoms of press, speech, and worship have a chance to thrive. It describes a democracy in which no man shall suffer discrimination because of his color or race. To me it means the freedom of all people to choose religion, jobs, and politics.

Old Glory stands for a nation where no man shall be a slave, denied the education and support that every human being positively must have.

In my heart, it means a free land, in which dignity and authority are maintained to the fullest and best of the country’s ability. This great flag symbolizes our growing and striding country as a whole, a world power seeking peace which stands ready to defend the rights desired and cherished by every single person and American. It’s a nation in which important officials of the United States are voted on by the people and are responsible to the people and is not a dictatorship. Under a dictatorship our country might fall as other have done in past wars. It may also, to me, stand for the bloody battles of past conflicts. It means honor for the men and women who have sufffered in order to hold this United States together in time of crisis. Old Glory means much to me. It is the symbol of my country.

There is much more to this little essay that is lost in the 40 years since it was written and, of course, the conflicts in the Falklands, Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan, and others have taken place since that time. The sentiment was meant to honor our veterans, and I hope that this year you will not forget to remember the sacrifices that those who have served in our armed forces have made for us. These are men and woman who realize what their flag means to them. Please try to give our vets the honor they truly deserve for having given their all to their country.